Sports card collections such as baseball cards have become a major investment vehicle. No longer is collecting baseball cards just a hobby for adolescent children idolizing their sports heroes. Card collecting is big business evidenced by the price for a rookie Nolan Ryan card being several thousand dollars. Card collection conventions are held throughout the United States wherein adults as well as children buy, trade and sell their collections of cards for considerable amounts of money. College students have even been known to support themselves through the buying and selling of baseball cards.
It is common knowledge within the card collecting community that the older the card, the more valuable it is. Some of the more valuable cards are of the baseball superstars of the 1940s and 1950s, such as Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio. The storage and protection of these valuable commodities is of great interest to card collectors. A card which has been water damaged, bent, torn, faded, or has had the edges rolled or frayed, is greatly depreciated in value. The card collecting hobby even has its own array of magazines which often include articles on the safe storage of card collections. Much opinion has even been given to the utilization of PVC or polyvinylchloride sheets for storing such cards since there is some evidence that over time the PVC sheets undergo a chemical reaction releasing hydrochloric acid which deteriorates the cards.
Previously, card collectors have stored their collections in shoeboxes, photo albums and any other unused container available around the house. The problem associated with photo albums has been previously mentioned in relation to the utilization of clear PVC sheets within the photo albums. Shoeboxes and the like do not provide a good, safe environment for the protection of cards since moisture can enter the boxes, the jumble of cards rub against each other damaging their finish and cards become bent under their own weight when stacked upon each other. Even the utilization of file boxes used for index cards or recipes does not provide the proper safety needed to protect the cards since a user then must thumb across the top of the cards looking for the one he or she desires. This tends to bend the top edges of the cards. The dividers within such storage devices are not rigidly held within the inside, thus the cards are still susceptible to bending and having their finish damaged since the cards remain stacked against each other resulting in friction contact between them.
Therefore, what is needed in the art is a storage device for card collections which allows the collector to file his or her cards in any order desired, but also provides an environment for the collection that protects the cards against damage from either rubbing against each other or being stacked against each other resulting in the bending of the cards and the fraying of their edges.
A further need exists in the art for a storage device for card collections which allows the user to transport the storage device to and from card collection conventions without the risk of the cards becoming damaged in transit.
A further need exists in the art for a card collection storage system which allows the cards to be maintained upright without undue friction between them and which allows the cards to be removed, or inserted, without damage.